Dual booting Windows 7 + XP problem

[codyray10]

About a week ago I needed to install a 32 bit OS, I had been running Windows 7 RC x64 prior to. After XP installed my computer just auto-boots into XP. I downloaded, EasyBCD and it recognized I had a Windows 7 partition, I played with that a bit and it still doesnt work. When the boot loader displays it just shows XP. I google'd a bit and it seems like I may need to mess with the boot.ini file. I cant even find that file (I showed hidden files), but even if I could find it, Im unsure of what might need to be changed. Any input would be appreciated.

 

[Billb2]

The Cliffs: You're screwed.........

When a OS is installed one of the things it does is to put a tiny bit of code on to the first sector of the boot disk. Them, when the computer subsequently boots, that tiny bit of code is loaded into memory and executed. On of the things that code does when it is executed is to call the boot loader.

Since you installed W7 after XP, W7 wrote over XP's boot code. If you had installed W7 after XP, The new W7 code would include W7 calling XP's boot loader too.

BCDedit, EasyBCD, etc. would work if Vista/W7 has been installed to a different HDD than XP (ie you had two HDDs, each with it's own boot code). Then BCDedit can see both codes and modify Vista's/W7's boot code to reflect the presence of an XP install.

Since that first sector is screwed up, BCDedit, and the like, can't help you because there is no W7 code to call W7's boot loader.

MS's OSs should be installed in the order MS released them. That way the new OS can see the older OS(s) boot code and modify it accordingly.

 

[Comdrpopnfresh]

i think there are a few ways to fix this- though, frankly, I am a bit grey on each (done different ones at different times- didn't document my actions)
1. you can put in a win7 install disk, and repair the installation- basically rewriting the boot sector to include all the installations
2. install ubuntu, or something with the grub bootloader- get your local settings for win7 fixed up to present the boatloader + options, and then remove the linux install
3. boot into the dominate os, and change the local variables to bring up a bootloader menu. unsure if trying to get xp to load win7 will yield much.

in vista- you'd want to go:
my computer->system properties->advanced system settings->startup and recover: settings->system startup

if you don't mind making an fat32 partition, you could try your hand at installing partition magic (or the norton variant) 'pq boot'. It'll insert a pause into the boot process, before any of the os's can take hold, and then hands off the boot process.

 

[codyray10]

I think I'll try the repair windows 7 install method, see if it works that way. If not it's not really too big a deal. Luckily, I keep my programs and other things on a separate partition so if I cant get back into 7, all I'm really losing is just the OS, can always reinstall it. Thanks for the info though, I wasnt aware if you intend on dual booting that its best to install in order of the OS release. Learned something new from this.